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Wednesday, 22 June 2016

The following guide will pertain to the current GvG system, and will be amended when we get closer to Beta 2 (with access to more information on the exact changes to come). Enjoy!

# Intro

A GvG is one of the most important parts of Albion, and without a complete understanding of what exactly they are or how they work, players aren’t getting everything they can out of the game. This guide will hopefully serve as a platform for introducing newcomers to what exactly a GvG is, and get them prepared for guild participation in these frequent events.

# Purpose

A GvG is necessary in Albion if you or your guild wish to stake a claim in the world, and own a piece of it. Depending on the state of ownership of a territory, you may:

- Claim: territory has no ownership and you may take it via the ‘territory manager’ building.
- Drop: you own the territory and may relinquish it (may be claimed by anyone).
- Defend: you own the territory and must defend it against an attacking guild.
- Attack: you do not own the territory and are fighting to take it.
- Raid: attacking a territory to drop its defender bonus (Raids are being removed).

# Defender Bonus

If you press “K” you’ll notice that all the territories have a number above them, and it will be positive, zero, or negative. The number you see represents the percentage “buff” or “de-buff” the defenders will have when you fight them. For example, if you declare an attack against a territory at ‘40’ defender bonus, be ready to fight players with a 40% stat bonus on their side.The defender bonus will change though a few ways. If a “raid” (will be removed from game) is placed on a territory, if successful will drop the defender bonus. Also note, if an attack is placed by the territory onto another territory, the attackers will suffer a ten (10) point loss from their defender bonus.

# Defender Points

All territories have ‘defender points’. You may consider these as “lives”. After a GvG, if the owner of the territory loses, they lose one point. On the last point, if the attackers win, they take the territory. If you are the defender and lose, you may slowly regain your defender points over time.

- City & Village Territory: may have up to three (3) defender points.
- Resource Territory: will only ever have one (1) defender point.

# Scoring & Objectives

During a GvG, there will be monoliths that you want to either attack or defend.You will see these points marked around the territory as giant rune-looking stones. A resource territory will have three (3) on the map, and a village/city territory will have four (4). Capturing these points essentially means nothing, you have to hold them.

If you look at the top of your screen during a GvG you will see two separate timers, one on top of the other. The 'lower' timer displays the amount of time left in the GvG, and once it reaches zero the defenders win (regardless of the scoreboard). The 'upper' timer is the important one; it’s a sixty (60) second timer that keeps refreshing itself. Once this timer reaches zero (depending on how many points a team has) the points will be tallied and deducted from their score. The first team that has their score reach zero, will lose.

Also, an important thing to remember is that a GvG isn’t about “getting kills” but more so about working together and using strategy to outsmart your opponent and win on the ‘Scoreboard’. However, you are rewarded for kills.

- KILL = 4 points

# What You Need

If you have not participated in a GvG before, then you may be surprised with how much goes into planning one, and how much you need.

- Gear

Yes, you will need a bit of gear. Depending on how well you do, you may die a lot or not at all. Personally, anywhere between four (4) and five (5) sets of gear is okay. So have this set aside and ready. For yellow zones be sure that the gear you bring is Tier 7 equivalent (7.1/6.2/5.3), as the item-power for yellow zones caps out around Tier 7.

- Stashing Gear
Gear (food, etc.) has to be put into a chest before the GvG starts (you may have it in your inventory, but I do not recommend this). This chest will be found in the territory you own, or at the Siege Camp you placed the attack from. Be sure that you put everything into the battle chest tab, and not the bank tab. If you put anything into the “bank” tab, it will not be accessible during the GvG. It’s also a good practice to organize your gear in the chest as well (split your food/potion stacks into 1’s to make it easier to only equip one, etc).
Also note, that you must put your gear into the chest from where your guild placed the attack from (siege camp), or in the territory from which you are defending. This means that if you are defending, you cannot put your gear into the siege camp from which the attackers placed their attack. If you do, you will not be able to access the gear during the fight.

- Food & Potions
Bring the best food and potions you can afford, because every stat counts. Make sure you have one food/potion for each set of gear you are bringing.

- Team
Depending on whether the GvG is based in a normal territory or a city, you will need either five (5) or twenty (20) players on your team. You may of course have less, but it’s not recommended.

- Territory/Target
If you have a territory, you must only wait (and feed the territory…) and you will be attacked, it’s only a matter of time. If you do not have a territory and you want one, then you will need to place an attack on one via a “Siege Camp”.

- Silver
Waging war isn’t cheap. Besides the gear you bring along, you have to pay to launch any and all attacks (only Warmaster + may declare attacks); launching from the territory costs 100k and from a siege camp, 250k. Also be sure to remember that you have to feed territories you own, and the food costs pile up. Must earn enough Albion Online Silver.

# Be On Time

A lot of guilds require you to be online a certain amount of time before a GvG in order to get ready and discuss some sort of strategy. This is a good practice and will lead to better organization and preparation for the team. Everyone will appreciate this. Also be sure you are in the same zone that the GvG is taking place in, or the zone where the attack came from. If the GvG starts and you are not in the correct zone, you will not be able to participate.

# Participation & Lockouts

You may only participate in one GvG every 24 hours. However, if there is more than on GvG in that same territory that day (or a nearby territory it touches), you may participate in those as well (as many times as you like).It is also worth noting that if you are signed up for a GvG and your guild decides not to participate, you will still be put on a 24-hour lockout period if you do not show up. If you do not have the members or decide not to participate, remember that you must leave the GvG team in order to not be locked out.

# When You Can Fight

All territories come with four (4) time slots for GvGs. These four times should best reflect the availability of your guild to defend the territory. This means that as an attacker, you may only place attacks at times that are provided by the defending territory.Also note, the only way to change the time slots of the territory is to go to the ‘territory manager’ building and drop ownership of it for a moment. Quickly reclaim ownership and you will be able to change the times in which others can attack you.

# Be Warned

If you have an impending attack or a planned attack already, do not drop the territory, as the attacker will immediately win the territory by default.

# Quick Equip

Going into a GvG you should always have the mindset that you are going to win. However, you may still die, and if you do you want to be as prepared as possible to get back in the action. Quick equip is a fantastic tool to use (especially for GvGs). If you happen to die, quick equip will save you and your team valuable time by getting you back into the fight much, much faster (be mindful though, that mounts/bags in the chest will be equipped as well if present). Every chest has the quick equip ‘button’ at the bottom. Also note that if you bring several different sets to a GvG, this option may not work very well for you.

# Final Comments

This guide reflects the current GvG system, and will not be the same in the future. This is to help newcomers now and have them get some GvG experience and have some sort of idea how GvGs work. I also realize that a lot of the information here is also only for the Warmaster position and above, but I hope it still helps shed some light on the subject. Take a glance over at the Upcoming GvG changes to get a better idea of what's to come! More cheaper Albion Online Gold can find our site here.

Tuesday, 21 June 2016

Be careful those ‘Legendary' weapons! They will spend you all money then make you poorer!

You all know how that works. Out of the blue someone send a battle request and because you are clicking like a maniac, and the ‘Accept' button is right in front of the re-roll button I click accept battle!

I fight the guy/girl and lose, walking back to the repair station. I want to go on with re-rolling, but it says ‘not enough money'… I am like huh…?
What happened?? Looking in my combat log and I see this:

This happens a lot guys… So I warn you! Please watch out with re-rolling, and please pay attention when someone send you a ‘battle request'. You lose all your money that you worked for so hard, in one simple click.

Typical scam situations
1. You standing in the middle of a busy town, someone fight you all the time. You fight him and win all of the time. He send you a request again, without you knowing he added 1000000 to the request. Because you were fighting him a lot you click accept without noticing this change. The fight is starting, that other guy is walking to his chest, grabs his best gear, fight you, you lose and you can wave your 1000000 goodbye;
2. This happens to me: You are re-rolling in a busy town and without you knowing this battle request pops up you click accept and you are screwed.

These are the two ways I know about, do noticed another way please send it in the reply and I will add it to this topic.

There is not really a way to fix this. You are already told in a fairly prominent location when the duel is requested how much the duel will be for. Maybe they could make the amount bright red but that still wouldn't fix the issue you're talking about if you're accepting on auto-pilot. For the problem of rerolling and auto-accepting a duel they added a timer (3 seconds) before you'd be able to hit accept. This was a fix they implemented quite a while ago now. In this way the button to accept a duel comes across as completely different to anyone who is paying any sort of attention because suddenly you get a button with a timer that you can't immediately click on.

I am not saying scamming still can't happen.It definitely can to people who aren't paying much, or any, attention. I don't see a way to further reduce it without severely limiting the dueling system, however.

Monday, 13 June 2016

Ability can be changed at any time by just changing gear. If you want to be a spell caster instead of a warrior, you only need to wear a casting staff instead of a sword.

All skills in Albion Online are associated with gear as well. These skills are applied on gear when you actually craft the item, and most items are crafted, or when the item actually drops. Some items will drop from humanoid enemies, so if you see a guy using a bow, there’s a chance he can drop a bow of his relevant tier. For example, if he’s a tier five enemy, he can drop a tier five bow.

Skills change also depends on items. Spear is going to have a different skill set to a bow although they are considered under that similar style of being a ranger or being a hunter. In addition, when you craft your own gear, you have choice to decide which skills you want it to have. More skills become available as you progress.

It goes the same way with armor. There are several types of armor in Albion Online and each of them has a various types of skills as mention in this beginner guide. You can have a choice to choose which skills you want through crafting as well. For example, when you craft a chest armor, you have choice either you want to have self-healing skill or a berserker buff.

Crafting can be quite expensive but it’s a good way of an investment. And it’s going to be the main focus on the game since classes are entirely dependent on gear. Because of this, Albion Online character progression is very complex.

Friday, 10 June 2016

Have mobs drop a range of Albion Online Silver, not a static number.
Different Mouse-over icons for the various gathering materials: Axe = wood, pick = ore, etc.

Loot needs to be highlighted when behind trees/etc.
Blood splatters when Demo-ing buildings. Olly makes sense if they’re mutated zerglings
The sound for adding resources to buildings doesn’t fit, just sounds like a sword swinging at air
Volume Slider for Mount Movement/Steps would be nice as it tends to be significantly louder than everything else around and can be obnoxious.
Increased base carrying weight seems useful or a slower reduction in movement based on weight. I max out on weight pretty quickly and it just “feels” like a longer time would be helpful. Then again, the world is much emptier than it would be at launch so I’m able to gather materials a lot faster than I could in that situation and it might fit better at that time.
Variety in monster/mob attack sequences/spell casts and Variety in damage output. Hitting for 39 every time I swing on a mob that does the same sequence of attacks and spellcasts turns into an incredibly repetitive combat encounter.
A suggestion to consider, not saying I’d recommend it, just something for more game-design savvy people to think about: Reset the materials needed to make T5+ processed goods so that T5 needs no pre-requisite, just like T1/Some T2. Then T6 needs a processed T5 + raw T6, same w/ T 7 and 8 etc. It seems like it would be a nice refresher after working your way up to T4 and could help reduce some of the monotony of always having to go back to low-tier resources.

Create a purpose for the random buildings, ruins, etc placed everywhere. Give them some things to search, destroy, have them randomly spawn mobs/bosses, etc.
Add tank viability w/ swords? Just a preference by me here.
Better visibility in large-scale combat. Distinguishing between allies, enemies, PVE mobs, etc, can’t be extremely difficult. Allow me to turn off allied cast bars so I can see enemy cast bars better. A better indicator of who my target is would be nice so I don’t get lost on where it went in hectic combat. Also, an auto-target feature would be useful as when the battlefield is cluttered, I’m often unable to target an enemy because my allies are crowding it.
Designation for weapons to show if they are 1h or 2h.

Tuesday, 7 June 2016

Someone asked how to tell what your enemies will be doing in PvP. Well, it's hard to tell what defines each type of weapon and armor without clicking through every item on the destiny board, so here's a quick breakdown of what makes each item unique!

Weapons

Q: Signature (Spam) Ability. 1.5-3s CD(or cast time)
Each Weapon Type (sword, bow, fire staff, hammer, etc) will have their own Q ability which is the same across all tiers. Most have a small special effect or characteristic (slow, poison, armor reduction).
Support weapons have a damage option and a heal/shield option. Bow has a second option on T5

W: Utility Ability. 7-10s CD
Each Weapon Type has their own set of 1-3 options (mostly two - one for more damage/healing, one for more special effects). These have special effects such as interrupts, slows, shield, fears, damage over time, dashes, knockbacks.

E: Ultimate (Special) Ability 15-30s CD
Each Weapon Type has a similar flavor or effect, but every weapon has their own Ultimate/Special Ability. Typically 2 of the weapons in a particular Type will have similar effects (broadsword gives armor/mr, claymore also gives armor/mr; staves all have knockbacks; spears have a dash and a pull; bows have AoEs).

Weapon Passive
Each Weapon Type has two passives, but only in their two-handed versions (Tx.2 and Tx.3 for most Types). Think "10% chance to gain damage/attackspeed/bleed/slow/castspeed". Typically one damage boost, one utility boost (attack range or energy or a slow) but it varies.

Identifying Weapons
You'll be able to instantly see if they have a sword, or a bow, or a certain staff, at which point you will know if they're going to be Q spamming a slow or damage. You'll have to remember that certain weapon types have different W abilities for utility, and wait to see if they have it as a damage boost or for utility. You'll have to remember that certain weapons have high dps, certain weapons have stuns and crowd control. You won't be able to tell what passive they have without inspecting them. And last, each weapon has a very different model, so you'll be able to tell what their Ult/Special is going to be.

Full List of Abilities by Devious[1]

Armor
Armor is a little harder - each Armor Type has different abilities, while Armor Material determines the type of defense.
Here's a picture from the forums a few weeks ago that shows all of the armor in the game: armor models, check it out![2]

D: Role (Utility) Ability - Chest - 30s CD
Chest armor gives you an ability to help you fulfill your typical MMO roles in a fight as a mage, fighter, or tank. Light armor helps you survive, medium armor helps you stick around to deal damage, and heavy armor helps you barge in and disrupt the enemy team. These all have both offensive and defensive uses.

F: Speed Boost - Feet - 20s (or 60s) CD
Boots give you a speed boost, they all have the same icon right now so you won't be able to tell which one people have in a fight.

Armor Materials - Determined by Chest Material
Plate Armor has ~10% more armor than magic resistance.
Leather Armor has equal armor and magic resistance.
Cloth Armor has ~10% less armor than magic resistance.
Check the size of their shoulders to see what type of chest piece they have, you NEED to know if they are going to be dealing lots of damage or taking lots of damage, and whether or not they can chase you down. Next most important is their helm - full, half, or scarf? This will determine if they can boost their damage, speed, or sticking power. Boots don't really matter, they have the same abilities and a very small damage or utility boost that will probably match the chest or helm.
Full List of Armor Details by Devious[3]

Bonus Info: Tiers
The Good: you can tell which Tier (1-8) people have based on the color of their armor or weapon. The Bad: you can't tell which Class (x.1, x.2, x.3,etc) people have based on the color of their armor or weapon.

T4.1 Heavy Plate is blue and has a power level of exactly Tier 4.1 for it's health, armor, and magic resistsance. T4.2 Heavy Leather is also blue, but has the power level of T5.1 gear. Someone wearing T4.3 Heavy Cloth would have total power level of T6.1 Heavy Plate, leading to slightly hidden power differences.

Weapons are the same: T4.1 Broadswoards are blue, but the T4.2 Claymore (also blue) has a power level equal to the T5.1 Broadsword. A T4.3 Glaive has the power level of a T6.1 Broadsword.

So, in addition to looking at their weapons to see their spells, and armor to see their role, also keep in mind the power spike as you go up in rarity. The more advanced (and unusual) the armor is, the higher the item power.

Power Chart with Developer Explanation at the bottom[4] also by Devious

Thursday, 2 June 2016

There are certain tedious tasks that are just better left up to automation sometimes. Sure, you need a steady flow of incoming wood and metal in Albion Online, but you don’t have the time to constantly harvest it yourself and play the game. That’s what the game’s laborers are for: taking care of menial tasks that keep basic materials or resources flowing while you devote your time to more elaborate goals.

Laborers can be hired for a reasonable initial cost, at which point the player can walk through a set of actions and request the laborer to follow the same basic pattern. The resultant haul will be less than what players could gather in the same amount of time, but it’ll mean that you can focus on more involved tasks than just gathering, crafting, or farming for money. Be aware, however, that laborers will require compensation for their work, adequate facilities, and a certain amount of space to themselves. Check out the video below for an overview of hiring and employing labor.